


in motion

by doublejoint



Series: peachtober 2020 [29]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Established Relationship, Other, Post-Canon, Threesome - F/M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:07:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27293941
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/doublejoint/pseuds/doublejoint
Summary: she’s transparent
Relationships: Alexandra Garcia/Himuro Tatsuya/Kagami Taiga
Series: peachtober 2020 [29]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1953295
Kudos: 2





	in motion

**Author's Note:**

> #peachtober day 29: Fossil
> 
> hbd tatsuya <3

“It doesn’t hurt to wait and make sure you get the shot off,” says Alex.

“In a game I won’t get to,” the kid she’s coaching retorts.

“Well, if you practice enough and go slow, it’ll be easy to do it in a game.”

The kid does not say she wants to do it now, though Alex can see the words almost rise to her mouth; instead, she squares her shoulders and dribbles, once, twice, still looking at the ball and almost losing it. Alex watches as she rises into a shot, an attempt at parroting the pros she sees on TV (and recognizably so, at least), but the ball lands a good two or three feet in front of the hoop and rolls to the base; she’s already off and running to retrieve it before it hits the ground. Tatsuya would do that, Alex thinks; Tatsuya has done that, more or less, said words to that effect--he still does. He is still trying to unlock as much as possible, as fast as possible. 

The kid shoots again, with the same result; she doesn’t ask Alex for any pointers, and Alex doesn’t give them. Even if she knows exactly what’s wrong, the kid won’t listen; let her try to figure it out for herself if that’s what she wants to do. There are more hours of daylight left than fit on one of Alex’s hands. They can both afford to wait.

* * *

The court begins to fill with college students done with internships, high-schoolers on detours from errands, adults done with their day-shift jobs or awake with a few hours to go before the night shift, but Alex stays. The kids are gone, back to their parents or at least a little closer to home, the kid Alex had been coaching having made a little bit of incremental progress, but she’d looked like she was afraid she’d lose it all tomorrow.

It’s a little unfair to all of them that Tatsuya and Taiga were Alex’s first pupils. In some ways, they’d spoiled her; they’d both wanted to learn and taken to it quickly. If she’d cut her teeth on something harder, been forced to look her own limitations in the eyes--she’d have quit, probably, back then, when she’d been full of so much self-loathing and doubt. And there’s no one who loves basketball as much as they do; every day they’d reminded her how much she’d loved it and how she’d never stopped. (Tatsuya will defend that title, the one who loves it the most, even though it doesn’t matter to anyone but him, because of course he will.)

Taiga never begrudged her that, and while the thought’s definitely occurred to Tatsuya, that he’d wanted more than she could have given him, he doesn’t blame her now. There are still feelings that none of them want to wade into, a toxic beach full of garbage they’ll wait to wash onto the shore.

* * *

It’s easy to live in the past and let it drag you back into its clutches again and again, like heavy adhesive that doesn’t quite snap away. If you stay still for a while. They’ve all done that, for one reason or another, or several at once. It’s not something you ever completely escape, anyway, even if you want to; you’ll always have the experiences that molded you and the memories that slip into your mind before you fall asleep, the stupid things you said that the other people involved might have forgotten, the time you did the wrong thing, the time good fortune won out. 

And they have each other, and the years of history built into that, versions of themselves that they’d mostly rather forget. Taiga is much older now than Alex was when they’d first met, in what almost seems like a mirror of a mirror of another lifetime.

* * *

Tatsuya kisses her good morning in the kitchen, holds her hand and deposits something small and sharp before she can taste the coffee on his mouth. He returns to pinching and pulling at his shirt collar to make sure it’s on straight, then takes another sip from Alex’s second-favorite mug, the chipped blue one. She’s pretty sure her favorite is still in the dishwasher. The thing in her hand stabs her palm and she looks down, blinking and adjusting her glasses so they’re a little less askew on her nose. A rhinestone stud earring--so that’s where it had gotten to.

“I found it in the couch cushion the other day, left it in my pants pocket.”

“Thanks.”

In all likelihood, she’s going to leave it lying around, lose it in the couch again or set it on the coffee table, knock it off when she’s clearing things away, and someone will kick it under the furniture. Still, it’s the gesture that counts, and one of these times around it’ll end up in her jewelry box unless it breaks before then.

The sound of the hot water through the pipes dies away. Taiga’s done with his shower, she supposes; glancing at the clock on the stereo he probably won’t get to see Tatsuya off. 

“Don’t work too late today,” Alex says.

“Who, me?”

“Come by the court. Help out a bit.”

She smiles at him, turning on the charm to get him to say yes--as if he’d say no anyway, if he could help it. He laughs; she’s transparent.

* * *

Taiga buys them all ice cream and meets Alex and Tatsuya at the court, holding all three cones in one hand like the showoff he only sometimes is--they wouldn’t blame him if he did that more. Or maybe, just a little, as he licks the ice cream off his fingers with no shame. 

“It’s fucking sticky,” he says, almost as if he expected otherwise. 

“Thank you for this,” Alex says, through a mouthful of her caramel pretzel cone, and Taiga smiles at her, his scowl softening out. 

“Yes,” says Tatsuya, “Thanks.”

They lean against the fence while they eat, watching the games unfold before them, one on almost every court. Tatsuya holds Alex’s worn-down ball under his arm, and when they’re all finished, there’s still a free court for them. 


End file.
